A bright pink earth pony sat at a table near the back of the club. There was a fedora pulled low over her frizzy mane. She looked around slowly and carefully, pausing to take a sip from the glass in front of her.
“Ah don’t know what good that disguise does, Pinkie,” said an orange mare sitting beside her. “Everypony in town already knows who you are.”
Pinkie straightened up and smiled at her friend. “I know, Applejack, I just found the perfect excuse to wear my detective hat.”
The other pony rolled her eyes. She’d known Pinkie for how many years now? It had been something like two decades since Twilight had come to town and pulled their little group of six together. In all that time, Pinkie had never changed.
Applejack herself had gotten a little older, but she had to admit that she was still pretty much the same mare. Sure, she was married and a mother now, but her duties as the Element of Honesty had never wavered. That’s why she and Pinkie were sitting there. If there was an evil magic user in the building that evening, it was their job to find him.
Outside, Twilight waited with Rainbow Dash. The purple unicorn had occupied herself with a book to pass the time, but the multicolored pegasus beside her had grown bored quickly. Still, if Pinkie and Applejack managed to locate the pony the six of them were after, they had to be ready.
Nearby waited Rarity. The white unicorn idly worked with a file. It would be dreadful to get into a fight and ruin her hooficure, but she wanted to be prepared anyway. Fluttershy was beside her, her yellow wings nervously tucked tight to her sides.
The four of them had been outside for quite a while, but eventually Pinkie and Applejack exited. The orange pony pointed a hoof at the back of a departing stallion. “He seemed pretty suspicious.”
“My Pinkie Sense was doing some totally strange things around him!” added Pinkie, an unusual jolt striking her body.
Twilight squinted into the distance. “That’s an earth pony."
“He could be the sorcerer we're looking for, but in disguise,” pointed out Rarity.
The other unicorn nodded. “True. All right everypony, let's follow him.”
The six mares gathered close as Twilight cast an invisibility spell over them. Keeping quiet, they followed the pony out of town.
Rarity rolled her eyes. “Of course he heads for the Everfree Forest. Just once I’d like to face a villain that knows how to live.”
As they cautiously followed the stallion into the woods, the darkness of night intensified. Twilight thought about casting a night vision spell. She could have performed the complicated magic without dropping the invisibility, but decided it wasn’t worth the distraction. It was a fortunate decision, as the six of them stopped dead at movement in front of them.
A pony crossed their path. His movements were shuffling, and there seemed to be something wrong with his neck. The horrifying thing, however, were his eyes. They looked like those of a dead thing.
“Ah think Ah saw him once before,” whispered Applejack. “He was passin’ through town a while back.”
Twilight nodded grimly. “We need to tell the Princess about this.”
▼▼
Golden hit the ground hard, but was back up in an instant. She flew at Cheerilee who lazily sidestepped and knocked the pegasus out of the air.
“Better, but still not fast enough,” advised the schoolteacher as Golden picked herself up again.
“I still can’t believe you wanted me to fight you,” muttered the white mare.
“Well, I did say no teeth. It’s only practice.” Cheerilee shrugged. While she was distracted, Golden attacked again, this time landing a hoof strike to the side of the other mare’s face. The earth pony shrugged it off like it didn’t hurt and wrapped her hooves around Golden’s neck, slamming her to the ground once more.
“Are you learning anything?” asked Cheerilee.
“I guess, but how did you teach yourself to do this?” Golden stood, waiting for her teacher to answer before attacking again.
“Trial and error,” said the lavender pony. “Mostly I just had to learn how to put mind over matter. Once you believe you can do something, it gets easier.”
Well if it’s that easy…I believe I have the ability to hold myself back from attacking innocent ponies. The pegasus was still cynical, however. Cheerilee still didn’t trust her, but she had a good reason. Golden didn’t trust herself, either.
Cheerilee closed her eyes, yawning. The white mare reacted instantly, realizing at the last moment she had been baited. Vampires didn’t need to breathe, and therefore no need to yawn. The schoolteacher’s ears twitched as she caught the flutter of feathers that signaled another attack. Without looking, she smacked Golden across the face so hard the pegasus flew in a completely different direction.
Dazed, the white mare picked herself up from the base of the tree she had slammed into. Cheerilee opened her eyes and smiled. “Have you worked up an appetite yet?”
“Absolutely.” Golden felt the bones in her neck realigning themselves after being knocked around.
“Let’s do something about that.” Cheerilee headed off to another part of the forest.
“More animal control?” asked the pegasus, catching up. Cheerilee had brought the younger mare along on one of her milder missions earlier in the week.
The schoolteacher nodded. “Right, except this time it’s a cockatrice.”
“How are we supposed to fight something we can’t look at?” asked Golden worriedly.
Cheerilee closed her eyes and kept walking, navigating between trees by the echoes of her steps. The white pegasus shook her head in wonder. She still had a lot to learn.
With a little time to herself while they walked, Cheerilee thought about her neighbor Tea. Friday was tomorrow, and she still hadn’t told him she couldn’t go on a date with him. To be fair, she hadn’t happened to see him, but that wasn’t much of an excuse.
The cockatrice was not a difficult foe to slay. Other than turning a pony who stared at it into stone, it was not very dangerous. From a safe distance, Cheerilee watched Golden try her luck. She looked like a foal trying to blindly swat a piñata, but did eventually dispose of the creature.
When the two of them returned home later, Cheerilee found a message from Princess Luna waiting for her. The letter was enchanted to be secure, and in fact nopony but her could read it. To Golden, it appeared as blank paper.
The schoolteacher opened the envelope, her eyebrows climbing as she read the letter. “This looks serious. I have to do some traveling this weekend.”
“You can’t leave me here alone,” pointed out Golden.
Cheerilee nodded. “You’re right.”
▼▼
Tea walked back to his house after school. It was Friday afternoon, but that didn’t make him happy. Cheerilee had come to his front door that morning and canceled their date. The stallion wanted to blame her for waiting so long, but she looked so sorry he couldn’t hold it against her.
Her reasons for canceling were somewhat confusing. Tea wasn’t sure what weekend business she might have in Ponyville, but hopefully she would be back soon.
The stallion checked his postbox, pulling out some mail and a newpaper. He carried it inside, the headline of the paper catching his eye. Dangerous to Visit Ponyville?
Hurriedly reading further, Tea discovered that several ponies passing through the town had been reported missing. It was a worryingly high number, almost all of them visitors.
Tea grabbed his bag of tools and took off for the train station. Before leaving town, he bought a pack of cigarettes, lighting one up to calm his nerves.